The Nearfar Record
by Nearfar
Summary: Wherein the chronicles of our intrepid summoner recount a chance encounter with the champion from his first ever match. R&R please.
1. Prologue & Part I

The Nearfar Record:

Compiled from the Writings and Notes of Summoner Nearfar

Prologue

The shivering figure of the summoner hunched over the desk shoved into the corner of his tiny dwelling space in the Institute of War. His breathing was a ragged rasp and reflected the urgency with which his hand dragged a pen across the page. His hand jerked at the end of a sentence and sent the ink bottle he hastily tried to dip the pen in crashing to the floor. A pool of blackness seeped slowly into the carpet as he thrust back the chair and reached to retrieve it. He swore once for knocking his ink over and again as a faint knocking at his door reverberated softly through the room and into the tangled mess of thoughts that spun cacophonously in his mind.

Part 1

Let it be clear from the outset that I abhor writing in the first person. Let it also be clear that the experiences I have had of late are incommunicable without resorting to it.

I have always been an...unorthodox summoner I suppose. That feeling of wielding power through another's being is an indescribable experience. The feeling of controlling another's actions and form are far more profound. It is intoxicating. It is revolutionary. It is a changing experience. I remember my first summoning: the taste of the air alive with magic in the chamber, the swirling eddies of blue light that consumed my vision as the process began, the feel of my being merging with another wholly alien consciousness.

Delicious.

It was at that moment that I made the decision that from then on I would where the required robes in the chamber but nothing under them. The feeling of that magic across bare skin was, for lack of a better word, arousing and I later determined that clothing interfered with that most pleasurable condition. I am many things. A man who denies himself pleasure is not one of them.

The first time a voice other than my own arched across my mind it was disorienting.

"_Ah..." the voice crooned, "I see the newest batch has arrived all doe eyed and dew kissed."_

I remember trying to breath. To separate my own thoughts from the torrent of magic connecting me to my first summoned champion, the Fallen Angel Morganna.

"_I...they never...said it would be...so overwhelming" My inner voice struggled for cohesion. _

I started as a spark seemed to shoot up my arm. Breath came fast and hard.

"_Be at ease summoner." The voice whispered, "We will bring them pain." It added with a sultry maliciousness._

"_Is it always this disorienting?" _

"_Only the first few times" the voice assured me. "At least that's what I am told by the others who summon me."_

"_That is reassuring." I added, her confidence calming my nerves and breath._

I felt power at my finger tips. Her power. It was intoxicating.

In a moment, we blinked away the bright light that bathed the Rift. I couldn't help but admire the beauty of the place despite the battles that waged constantly across its fields. Towers, demolished and rebuilt constantly stood majestically along the three lanes of the arena as if freshly raised.

"_Are you anxious summoner? Do you crave their blood as I do?" whispered the dark lady across our link. _

"_I do. The fields call out for it my lady." I whispered back._

"_Then let us begin." She replied with blood lust masquerading as glee._

_I laughed with her._

-Later-

I returned to my room after the match thoroughly worn out from the battle. It was clear to me now why I had entered the Institute in the first place. I was addicted to power in all its forms and manifestations. Morganna's dark magics had inflamed that desire to new heights. I felt the thrill when she bound an opponent and I shuddered with dark pleasure as they slowly melted away before her power.

My head was spinning from the new sensations of being acknowledged at last as a Summoner. I was positively giddy with my accomplishment and collected a small bag of herbs and amber pipe for a stroll through some of the more secluded gardens littering the Institute's grounds.

Three gates and a left down a dirt trail later and I found myself surrounded by the deep greens and shocking purples of what some call "Acolyte's Rest". Winding down two more trails I found my favorite spot on an ancient stone bench beneath two towering trees. I breathed deep the still air and found it somehow different. The plants around me were more noticeable. The faint musty smell of the forest seemed to suggest to me that no one had been through here in quite some time.

"_Good." I said to myself._

With that I settled about packing and lighting my pipe. The pungent smell wafting down the path I had walked to arrive. I drew deep with eyes closed and thought I heard soft footsteps padding the trail from the opposite direction I had come from. I blew out the smoke and through the haze I saw a figure coming through the shadowy low hanging branches.

I continued to watch the figure approaching. I squinted but the light filtering through the trees combined with the relaxing properties of these particular herbs still shrouded the identity of the intruder. I replaced the stem in my teeth and drew again. The figure at this point could be distinguished as female. Female and Tall I decided.

I decided then to break the silence and make her aware of my silent vigil.

"Good afternoon. It's an unusual sight to see other people out this far." at this point I rose from the bench, "Not that company is entirely unwan..." I stopped mid-word and stood slack jawed.

"Close your mouth Summoner. Swallowing flies will be the least of your worries should you continue to gape at me like that." Her wicked smirk did nothing to hide the venom in her voice.

I shook my head and promptly inclined it to her, "Apologies my lady." I hurried out, "I was afraid that I had become a bit too...relaxed and was seeing things." At this I held up the still-smoking pipe. "I was quite surprised to see you come walking out of the woods."

There was something strange about seeing her in person when I had been connected to her not an hour beforehand. It was the sort of sensation that can cause an existential crisis. And it did.

"I'm sorry if I have intruded on you Lady Morganna. I was seeking to clear my head after the match today. First time in the rift, as it were." I explained, chuckling at the end.

"And tell me Summoner." She grinned wider, "What was the rift like? Did you enjoy your first time in the rift? With me?" She cackled.

I was deeply uncomfortable. Nothing is more disarming than a woman with wit.


	2. Part II & Interlude I

Part II

I wasn't sure whether to laugh or run. So I did the only logical thing that was left for me to do: I took another draw off the pipe and gave her an actual answer.

"It was astonishing."

The words escaped before I had time to swallow them. To bite my tongue. To stuff my fist into that cavern of idiocy before those words had managed to taste free air.

"Well now." She said with an unusual flicker of a smirk. "Astonishing was it?" She raised a clawed digit to her face.

She stepped closer and her menace eclipsed the shadow of the trees that shaded us. I put the pipe down on the bench and ran a hand through my hair.

"Well since I can't take back what has been said, yes." I sighed. "It was astonishing, overwhelming, terrifying, and sublime all at once."

I shook as my eyes closed in recollection of the summoning: of the blood that had stained the grass at our feet and of the exquisite agony of dying again and again. I relived the feeling of her magic flowing from our hands. The cries of our enemies and the shrieks of delight as we waded through their fleeing forms only to feel their life force snuffed out by the force of her will.

I shivered with pleasure as she reveled in the havoc we wrought across the field.

I opened my eyes half lidded expecting to see my last visions be that of a furious sorceress in her wrath. She had every right to unleash it on me. I had used her as a tool of war. I had commanded her to kill. I had enjoyed it. I had even relished it. Instead through the haze of memory and blood lust I was greeted by the cold touch of a finger along my jaw.

"How unusual." She cooed, merely arms length from where I sat petrified.

"I know exactly what it was you experienced during the match." At this she pressed the sharp edge of her finger against my neck. I felt a warm trickle run down along her finger and drip against the dark fabric of my robes.

She stepped closer.

"Astonishing isn't exactly the word I would use to describe it." Her voice dripping with tones of ageless knowing.

I glanced upwards and wasn't sure if it was relief or terror I felt seeing the smile spread across her face. The blood ran under the robe's collar and down my clavicle.

"I suppose it's the less embarrassing of the words I could have used." My response was delivered as a man unsure of whether or not he had earned a pardon from his own execution.

She continued to smile that dark smile. "How tactful of you." She quipped as she dug the fingernail in just enough to force me to stand. "I will put your fears to rest summoner." She lessened the pressure "I have decided that I will not make your life unpleasant."

I heaved a sigh of relief as my head swam from the combination of the herbs and constant adrenaline.

"I'm very glad to hear that." I said, half under my breath but wholly sincere.

"I am intrigued by you. It's rare to find such appreciation and...lust for my powers in such an inexperienced summoner." She drew the finger to the point of my chin and raked it off. I watched the digit curl in torturous deliberateness towards her face.

"Summon me again soon. I wish to...evaluate your talents on the fields again." She smirked and turned to walk down the path I had taken away from the institute.

I watched her go still vaguely unsure of whether the whole incident happened. The dried crust of blood along my neck assured me that reality was indeed a strange, strange place. I fell back onto the bench as my breath slowed to the point where I felt I could catch it. Shaking fingers fumbled with the still smoking pipe and I drew again seeking relief from the tremors that seemed to have gripped me as the Dark Lady faded into the shadows of those deep woods.

Interlude I

The summoner's breath seems to call as he raises the thin stem of a pipe to his lips and draws deeply. The smoke swirls from his nostrils in thin streams as he sinks back into his chair's worn padding. His fingers regain their steady grip on the quill and he continues to scribble. The knock again carries through the chamber at greater volume this time. The summoner's head whips around to glare at the door, a strange snarl twisting his otherwise handsome face into something far more...inhuman. He heard steps going away from his door and he calmed down. Facing his desk again he began to write with renewed fervor. His eyes wild as his hand flew across the page scratching out a maddening symphony on the thick paper. He traced symbols and arches with unnatural dexterity driven by some otherworldly energy. His mind raced round and round. He would be with her. Even at the cost of his own body, his own mind, and his own soul should that be the price.


End file.
